


Just Her Luck

by Hedgi



Category: The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-22
Updated: 2018-02-22
Packaged: 2019-03-22 09:00:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,223
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13760715
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hedgi/pseuds/Hedgi
Summary: A Teacher once said she'd been born under an unlucky star. Becky thought it must have been an entire universe.4.13 reaction fic, Becky sharp introspective.





	Just Her Luck

Wanting the universe to be more fair had never made it so, and it never would. Unfair, unfair, unfair, nothing in Becky Sharpe's life had _ever_ been fair. A pile of good things and bad things, except the good things always got taken away, or ended up being bad things after all. A particularly New-agey English teacher had once said Becky was born under an unlucky star. She thought every star in the sky had to have been unlucky, for this much misfortune.

 

She remembered, on more than one occasion, wailing up at the sky (raining or snowing or hailing, whatever weather she hadn't been prepared for) “Can't you be unfair in _my_ favor for once?” It seemed the universe had been listening all those times after all, and it was laughing. One more bit of bad luck, one more joke, because it had granted her wish and _look_ where that had gotten her. A round little cell with shitty lighting and a hard mattress full of springs.

 

Becky made the best of it. She always did. There wasn't exactly much choice, there never was much before. Land on your feet or on your butt, either way, you're on the ground and you can't stay there. She was used to it.

 

Of course her luck caught up with her right away. Her only blanket had ripped the first night, caught where a spring came loose and scratched her leg. She'd ripped it more getting it free, and the guy in the next cell had watched her work and smirked. She'd folded and tied the blanket until it was vaguely doll-shaped, floppy and ragged. The same guy in the next cell peered at her.

 

“That a VooDoo Doll? You know your powers won't work here, but nice try, blondie.”

 

She ignored him. Of course she knew. Not that she'd have used her powers... well, maybe. Just a little. But no. what if it hurt someone completely random to balance it? She wouldn't mind trading a little luck for giving the cellmate a stubbed toe, but....it didn't matter anyway. She hugged the doll close, worrying the thin fabric between her fingers.

 

The next morning they gave her a new blanket, and when it ripped and the detergent irritated her skin, she left it be. What was the point? With her luck, she probably wouldn't get a third. Her curse extended beyond bedding to the food—new allergies or food poisoning from mystery-meat that was a little too much mystery – and anything else that could go wrong, though no more than usual.

 

Time skittered forward—it was hard to tell, with no windows, or time in the prison yard (White Collar and Orange is the New Black had _lied_ to her, she decided) and when she'd tried to make tallies on the wall, the pen had run out of ink. She got new cellmates. Some seemed nice enough, even if Mina never smiled. Others scared her, like the first guy and the next one, reminding her of Self-Important men from her job at the Casino. And the one before that at the bar. And the office supply store. And the cafe, and the gym. She did her best to ignore them, since she wasn't getting paid to be polite, though it made things lonely. She made the best of it, cuddling her floppy rag doll and trying to focus on the good things, or at least the Not-Bad things. Like the mattress instead of the floor, and the fact that there were no rats or spiders. She looked on the bright side, and as soon as she did, she checked the shadows, just in case.

 

And then the warden, Wolfe, brought in someone vaguely familiar. He was unconscious. Becky wondered if the police had caught him, or if the Flash had, what he'd done. Was he like Mina, using his powers to do bad things that were probably more justified than not? Or was he more like the dick in the next cell, always saying that the Universe Owed him—as if the Universe owed anyone or gave a crap—and muttering about wanting to kill the other people who'd screwed him. Becky had wanted to shout that if she'd killed everyone who'd ever screwed her over , she'd have a higher bodycount than three quarters of the entire prison combined. She knew better, of course, than to risk pissing him off.

 

Maybe he was like her. He hadn't realized his powers were hurting people until he was caught up in the joy of them, not realizing they were no gift.

 

She didn't ask. She didn't have time. She could hear Wolfe on his phone, promising someone something. Or someone. It scared her. She slept badly, and woke to the sound of footsteps, and a woman's voice.

 

“Yes, yes, less history lesson, more window shopping,” the mystery woman said. Becky pulled her feet up to her chest, watching through the cell door as Wolfe told her about their powers, and the woman spoke of drug smugglers and profit. Mina and one of the men responded, but Becky curled up small, trying not to draw attention. Maybe if she just sat here and hugged her little doll, she'd get lucky.

 

It was a slim hope, and it shattered as the woman declared she'd take them all, singsong, like she was a child and they were toys on a shelf, not people.

 

Alone again, Becky rocked, clutching at anything she could to keep her grounded, her doll, her pillow, her knees. The exposed spring poked her and she shifted, near tears from worry and fear. _Bidding war_ , the woman had said. Like countless ebay auctions Becky'd lost, only now it wasn't over trinkets and her own stolen possessions and things.

 

She swallowed. She'd nearly blown up the city, or worse, they'd told her that, and—and that had been without meaning to. What she could do—what someone could _make_ her do...She never wanted to hurt anyone again, but she wasn't counting on getting much of a choice.

 

A choice. If only she could control her powers better. If only she could make herself lucky with the bad luck only doing little things, spread out, like—like maybe ten different people all stepped in a shallow puddle, or maybe harmless things, a couple of people walking into glass doors and looking silly, or a kid who was making straight A's missing two questions on an unimportant quiz, or—or if she could make sure the bad luck only happened to the people trying to hurt her. She thought, that last part might be doable, but she wasn't sure, and the risk scared her, and there wasn't any point anyway. She couldn't use her powers here, and that woman probably had cuffs like the ones the Flash and the cops had used, and the person who bought her would probably have them too.

 

She hugged her pillow to her, sandwiching the doll between it and her chest. _Please please please, Universe, if you owe anyone, you owe me, just a little. I'm not asking to get out, I just don't want this, please. Please don't do this to me. Please, don't let this happen._

 

The new guy—a Speedster, Wolfe had said, and she hoped he was more like Kid Flash or Flash instead of the first one in Yellow, or the one in black, all murdery, but maybe it was better if he was a killer because then she wouldn't feel too sorry for him, but no, she would-- started moving, checking his door, moving to his toilet. Did he think he could fit? He was skinny but not that skinny and that wouldn't work anyway, not with all the luck in the world, and they were in short supply. He ignored the heckling, promising to get them out. Becky wasn't sure if she believed that, it seemed too good to be true, and that always signaled a spout of ill fortune.

 

She wondered what his plan was, though, if getting them all out worked. They couldn't just be fugitives. Well, maybe they could, but she'd get caught in hours, probably. Fugitives needed Luck, and she _couldn't._ Maybe they could go to the media, a warden trying to sell them on the black market had to be grounds for _something._ An appeal, or—or commutation, or even just getting put in a prison where they could see the sky once in a while and not get bid on like a Ming Vase. A Twitter storm on their behalf might help. Whatever happened, she'd just have to make the best of it. There weren't any other options.

 

Her door clicked open with a hiss, and the new guy waved her out, and the others. Huh. She'd half expected him to just bolt on his own. Or for her door to be the only one that stayed closed. She watched him, wanting to ask why he was risking his own freedom by taking them with him, by helping them. They weren't friends, they didn't even know each other. More people, more chance of getting caught, more chance of getting hurt. But she kept her moth shut. She didn't want to jinx it. Either he hadn't considered the danger, or he had, and he'd decided it was worth it. Maybe he wasn't a villain, or an ordinary but out of depth person who'd done something awful. Maybe he thought of himself as a hero, looking for redemption. Whatever his reason, if it kept her belonging to herself, Becky decided that intentions didn't really matter. The actions were enough.

 

 

~

 

She should have guessed. It was just her luck, literal inches from escape, and they were caught. She wanted to cry, hot pressure behind her eyes. It wasn't fair. It wasn't fair. It wasn't fair and she trembled as she looked from Wolfe to the door to the guards with their weapons to Barry, fallen.

 

Didn't Mina and Rundine and Decon understand? Didn't they see?If they killed Barry, or hurt him—they'd still all just be back where they started, in the same sinking boat he'd pulled them from. Did they think Wolfe would let them go, let them kill the Flash and walk out the door, losing all that money? It was a distraction, a division, it would get them all stuffed into shipping crates. They could get out, they could still make it, Decon could destroy the cuff around Barry's leg, they could escape, but not if they let Wolfe win. He probably wanted them to exhaust themselves fighting Barry, so he could take them again without fuss, and chain them, and give them to the woman with the braids. If they didn't turn on Wolfe and his men, they'd be as good as sold, didn't they care about that?

 

And anyway, he wasn't the reason they were in prison. Wolfe was the reason they'd been in that hell hole, and yeah the Flash had caught them, but – Mina and Decon had killed people, and Rundine had, too, and she hadn't but almost--

 

it wasn't fair. It wasn't fair. All her life, things had been unfair and she'd made the best of it, landing on her ass instead of her feet, but maybe this time, she could do more than fall. She reached for her Luck, and turned it loose. Maybe she was making Barry Lucky, maybe herself, maybe she was just trying to rig the universe against those who threatened their freedom. Maybe she could have let the fight cover a run for the door, but without the Flash she'd never get far, and they'd spend their lives as slaves or puppets, weapons or tools, and it _wasn't fair--_ but the universe never did care about fair.

 

One second it seemed this might actually shift their way, like they might actually manage to get out, and the next there was a burst of light, and metal clamped around her head.

 

She couldn't scream as she watched light pulse from the strange hovering machine along the metal cords, and the people who'd been her cellmates for the last months-weeks-days fell, one by one. She reached again for her Luck. There was a way out. There had to be, there had to be,She could get lucky, make sure the machine backfired, make the wires fray and spark and snap-- she knew she could. It would just cost everyone around her.

 

It was too late for Mina, and Decon, and Rundine and Wolfe, and maybe they'd deserved it—it was a better fate than an auction block, anyway, but there was no time for that. But the Flash. Her Luck would make him trip, or falter, she'd escape, and it would be a matter of time before she hurt someone again, or the woman with the braids found her, or the man in the chair with his machine. The Universe would catch up with her again, and then what?

 

The Flash reached for her hand. She could do it. She gripped her power, like a pair of dice burning in her palm as he grabbed for her, and ordered it to do what she wanted.

 

 _Good Luck,_ she thought to him.

 

And then her thoughts were no longer her own.

 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> I LIVE.
> 
> poor becky. She deserves better. please love me.


End file.
